3 year old Human Aggressive dog

His owner came to me by a chance meeting. He had already been bitten 4 times (face, hand, arm, arm -all stitches), his girlfriend once in the hand (stitches), his girlfriend's father (hand - stitches) and his own mother (hand - stitches, permanent nerve damage).

I'm very happy to update that he has overcome his aggression and is now a part of the family. He can actually play with the kids now!

Category:

Pets & Animals

Tags:

• dog
• training

[kabz85]

We dont do that .... well he sure does....

[mydogkanskidrums]

@NickBenger I'm sorry, but I cannot agree. I work with dogs- many of who have behavioural issues- and positively punishing (i.e. introducing an aversive, e.g. saying 'No') will only serve to freak a fear-aggressive dog out more. You need to ask the question- why is the dog afraid? He's afraid of people. It's completely acceptable what's it's doing as it has had bad experiences. If we teach a dog that humans are good, we don't need to punish the bad- it'll go away on it's own.

[mjfromga89]

@BlueGama600 Kick the dog? BAD idea. Firstly, if you hurt an already fearful animal, he may strike back, which probably equals a nasty bite since this is a rottweiler. Secondly, that will not solve his problem. The most dangerous dogs are abused dogs! Kicking the dog will NOT show him that people are not a threat, it will do the opposite. Horrible training methods like this is what causes dangerous animals to become even MORE dangerous.

[tagra11]

not vey helpful

[K9ProSportUSAdotcom]

@00JKS Heartless is how you come off describing why you kept a human aggressive fear biter alive when it rips a chunk out of the neighbor kid's face. of course, you're super responsible and that'd never happen, but people like you like to think that all dogs are loving children who act out because of some past abuses instead of the fact that hey, he has bad nerves because of crappy breeding and plain isn't safe. I feel for your clients. I bet you've never even titled a dog in OB or Sch.

[BlueGama600]

@mydogkanskidrums Ok well that's a smart idea :D

[mydogkanskidrums]

punishing for a largely involuntary response to something. It should be our responsibility to help them get over their fears, slowly and at their pace. One technique I use is the 'Look At That' game, i.e. as soon as the dog looks at something they are afraid of, they are rewarded immediately. When they look again, they are rewarded. This continues until the association is built that those stimuli= good things. Dogs learn via associative conditioning, so this is called 'counter-conditioning'

[mydogkanskidrums]

humans a happy one. Imagine you are afraid of flying, and someone puts you up in a plane, and when you begin to panic, they shout at you, slap you, tell you to 'snap out of it'- would this help you get over your fear? It may stop you outwardly acting fearful, i.e. the behaviours may stop because you are afraid of being punished, but your inward emotions will probably be the same. Dogs don't possess a rational mind, they can't reason. When people punish for aggressive responses they are...

[mydogkanskidrums]

@BlueGama600 You do need to show the dog that people are not a threat- but how is punishing them for aggressive responses helping this? Aggression is one behaviour on a scale of stress. There's no point waiting for the dog to show the behaviour, then punishing them, as by this point, the dog is so stressed out it's 'over-threshold', i.e. in survival mode and not learning. Any punishing here is just damage control. The best approach is to keep the dog un-reactive and make the presence of...

[BlueGama600]

@mydogkanskidrums Are you saying not to punish a fear aggressive dog at all? Yeah that's great until that dog attacks some child out of fear. Look I'm sure you know a lot about dog training, and I don't want to be telling you what you should do, but I think you need to somehow show the dog that people are not a threat, rather than just do nothing and hope for it to 'cure itself'

[BlueGama600]

Just kick him in the head ffs. He's being aggressive to you because your letting him. He knows who's the boss(him), and you have to change that. Quit being a pussy. A dog of that size could seriously injure(and even kill) someone and it won't be the dogs fault, it will be yours, but the dog will be put down and you won't(Which you should).